Dangerous wording on letter to congress re: salmonella and reptiles as pets

I felt the same way about that quote. When I sent the letter to our state assemblymen, I changed it. It originallly said, "The occurrence of Salmonella is frequent in all reptiles sold as pets and many foods , yet the FDA has banned only the sale of turtles under a certain size. " I added the part in red.

Tony Alles
www.reptileguru.com

I'd change it to include "all animals," no mention of "all reptiles."

Maybe even include a line calling out cats specifically using what BrianB stated in this thread. Just to drive the point home that its not just "all reptiles" we should be worried about.

That is exactly the problem with the letter. It does not include reference to cats, dogs, goldfish, or the myriad other animals that can and DO carry salmonella. ONLY reptiles are included. I contacted Richard at Riparian Farms, who is the one that supposedly wrote it to voice my concerns about the wording of the letter, but also to let him know I DO agree with a revision to the 4-inch law, which to me has always been absurd.

However, this letter seems to be fairly shortsighted and not so well-conceived. The intent seems honorable after reading it over a few more times, but the execution in my opinion, poor.

It seems that the letter kingsnake is promoting is doing 2 things-


1- asking for the ratification of a proposal that is now on the table.
2- asking for the removal of the 4inch turtle rule



We have to send a letter that supports 2 but calls for a modification of proposal 1. We can't simply modify the wording of the quoted text. We have to include our own protest of the wording as well.

Here's one for congress and the salmonella cause
I have been keeping herps for many years ...cought the bug once...not from the herps....but from a grocery store down in Florida[ one of the bigger chains]
But I guess the meet deli person had some reptiles at his house''''YEAH RIGHT!!!!!!!!

Hmm. It looks like KS has removed the posted letter in question. It would appear that they also saw something wrong with it.

I just wanted to let everyone know I received what appears to be an automated response from Richard at Riparian Farms, who is supposedly the author of the letter/proposal.

This response was rather vague and mainly just repeated what the initial letter said in the first place. None of my concerns and those of others about the letter was addressed. I wrote back explaining this and hopefully I will get a "live" response from Richard regarding why only reptiles were mentioned.

In the response, it states that the FDA is aware that ALL reptiles can carry salmonella, but that only small turtles are being singled out. However, by his statements, HE is guilty of the same. Out of ALL the animals we have around us and in our homes and on our dinner plates, he is singling out REPTILES.

After receiving the automated response along with another e-mail from Richard containing the SAME letter for me to forward/sign, I feel that this person does not particularly care what the rest of the community thinks of his actions in this instance. Automated responses do not address concerns. A vague response and another copy of the same letter I was opposing shows he didn't even bother to read what I had to say(which was that I will NOT sign/forward the letter in its present form).

I also asked about this 100% salmonella free technology he speaks of for turtles and tortoises. I have never heard of this and to my understanding, any and ALL reptiles have the potential and often times DO carry it despite what we do.

Here's the info blurb that KS used to have up, from the NRAAC site:

http://www.nraac.org/salmonella.html

Here's more than you ever wanted to know about

salmonella:http://www.salmonella.org

If anyone's interested in writing Congress, these are better places to look for facts than the turtle guy's site. (No offense to turtle keepers out there, I just can't remember the guy's name =)

This cracks me up... One site stated that there are approximately 93000 cases of reptile-related salmonellosis per year in the US...but the CDC site states there are approximately 40,000 cases of salmonellosis in the US. That's all forms and sources.

Uh, someone must be doing that "new math"....


http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/disea...osis_g.htm#How common is salmonellosis

The quote in question does not worry me. I don’t think its inclusion in the letter in question will effect anything more or less because that quote comes from the wording of the House Joint resolution.

What does worry me is the following quote from that same letter:

The FDA should not prohibit the sale of baby turtles arbitrarily, and particularly due to the availability of 100% Salmonella free turtles.

If Congress does decide to repeal the old law, thereby allowing sub four inch turtles to be become commercially available legally, don’t you think there will be a catch. I do. I think the turtles will be required to be certified as Salmonella free. If that becomes the case, it will require bureaucracy to accomplish the certification. The FDA will likely have to inspect turtles to assure they are Salmonella free. This will come with a price, and the price of the turtles will skyrocket.

Of course, since I work for the government, I can expect no less a foul up than this, but I can certainly envision more of a screw up. You see, the letter also has another choice sentence within it, allow me to quote that letter once again:

It is expected that these same procedures can be used to eliminate the risk of Salmonella in all pet reptiles.

So if they pass such legislation, why not just add on a bit about requiring all pet reptiles to be certified as 100% Salmonella free?

To me, this letter’s wording does sound very similar to the writings of a certain person who works various herp related websites, who in my opinion, is a misguided anti Salmonella, and possibly anti herp ownership, kind of a person. While I do not know the writing style of the person who claimed to have written this letter, I wonder if the fellow who wrote this had any help from a person, who in my opinion, seems to display the attitude of: ‘I have gotta be in control of herpdom and fellow herpers because I alone know better than all of them”? This letter, as written, is potential dynamite in that it may blow up the whole darned hobby and leave little but rubble and dust.

Best regards,
Glenn Bartley